Six days a week, twenty-eight-year old Ella May Wiggins makes the two-mile trek to and from her job on the night shift at American Mill No. 2 in Bessemer City, North Carolina.  While the dirty hazardous job at the mill earns Ella May a paltry nine dollars for seventy-two hours of work each week, it’s the only opportunity she has.  Her no-good husband has run off, and she must keep her four young children alive with whatever she can find.

When the union leaflets begin circulating, Ella May has a taste of hope, but to maintain their control, the mill owners will use every means in their power, including bloodshed, to prevent workers from banding together.  On the night of the county’s biggest rally, Ella May makes up her mind to join the movement—a decision that will have lasting consequences for her children, her friends, her town—indeed all that she loves.

Intertwining myriad voices, Wiley Cash brings to life the struggle of the labor movement in early Twentieth Century America—and pays tribute to the thousands of heroic women and men who risked their lives to win basic rights for all workers.  Lyrical, heartbreaking, and haunting, this eloquent novel confirms Wiley Cash’s place among our nation’s finest authors.